- 5 months ago
NYC, Entrepreneurship, & Healthy Living
Howdy, I'm Taylor. I'm a 20 something former management consultant and ivy-league grad from California turned solopreneur in New York City, and I love making videos that follow all of the above. Stick around 😊
Howdy, I'm Taylor. I'm a 20 something former management consultant and ivy-league grad from California turned solopreneur in New York City, and I love making videos that follow all of the above. Stick around 😊
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LearningTranscript
00:00I made $14,200 in one year doing this side hustle and you should too. Yep, I made that much selling
00:07used clothes online. Seriously. What's up friends? Today we're talking about how I got into this side
00:12hustle, how much money I made doing it, why you should do it too, and the basics on how to get
00:16started, and if I am still doing it. All right, how did I make $14,200 in one year selling used
00:22clothes online? Tiny rewind. If you're an OG viewer on my channel, you already know this, but quick
00:26recap. I graduated college in May 2020. I was set to start my full-time job as a consultant eight
00:32months later in January 2021, and during that eight months off, I had grand plans to travel the world.
00:37However, due to the global panini, my start date got pushed back even further to April 2021, and of
00:43course, it goes without saying, I could not travel the world. So I basically had a full year, 11 months
00:48to be specific, off. During these 11 months off, I wanted to find a nice balance of relaxing and taking
00:54time off to kind of rediscover some passions and some hobbies, because it was the first time I'd had
00:58a serious break, really, since I was a kid, and also the last time I'll have a serious break like
01:04that until... I don't even want to think about it. So a balance between that me time, Taylor time, and
01:10also, you know, doing something productive, ideally something that would maybe make a little bit of
01:14money. And this first quarantine side hustle of mine that I'm about to tell you about happened by
01:18complete accident, kind of. So I came home from college in May 2020, I took my suitcases, and I
01:24dumped out all of my belongings onto the floor of my childhood bedroom. I looked at all the clothes,
01:29there's a lot of it, and I realized I'm just not going to wear a lot of this stuff again. I don't love
01:33it, not every piece makes me feel confident, etc, etc, and I want to start downsizing. And I want to
01:38start curating a closet that I actually really feel good about. That part came later, so let's talk
01:42about the downsizing. Long story short, I downloaded an app called Poshmark that I know I'd heard of
01:47somewhere, started listing things that I didn't want anymore, and I was hooked as soon as I made
01:51my very first sale. Pretty quickly, I realized that this is something that I find really fun,
01:55it's something sustainable, and something that made me a little bit of money. First, I sold a ton of
01:59stuff from my own personal closet, which I actually viewed as pretty much pure profit, because at least
02:04in my eyes, that piece of clothing was fully depreciated. You know, I had worn it for its entire
02:09lifetime, not in the sense that it was like torn to shreds, but that I was done with it, and that
02:13someone else could now use it. So from there, after I sold a lot of this stuff out of my own
02:16personal closet, I took it a step further to scale this little business of mine and started thrifting
02:22clothes. So I would go to the thrift store and buy clothes that I thought had a decent amount of
02:26resale value, and then flip it for profit. I did this pretty much until at my peak, I was making
02:30about $2,500 per month in sales. $2,500 a month, you know, it's not enough to live on, at least here in
02:37Los Angeles or in New York, where I am moving to tomorrow.
02:45But it's still a pretty nice chunk of change. At the very least, it was fun to be able to do this
02:48project from home on my own time. I could set my own hours and just do it while I was hanging out
02:53with the family for this pretty much year that I had off. And clarification for those that are curious,
02:57yes, I said $2,500 in sales, and that $14,200 is also in terms of revenue. If you're curious about
03:03my actual profit, which I'm sure many of you are because that's what actually matters. After my
03:07cost of goods sold and platform fees, my profit margin was still usually right around 65%, so
03:12still not too shabby. Very final point here, editing Taylor from New York. Wow, pretty. Anyway, final
03:19point here is that I don't think I emphasized in the video just how part-time this was for me. That's
03:24not to say I didn't put in a lot of hours. I definitely did, especially when I was really getting
03:28into it. But this amount that I made is nothing compared to other resellers I know, specifically
03:32ones who do it full-time. I mean, you can make a full-time living from this. So I just want to
03:36clarify that this $14,000 plus in one year, it's good, but it could have been a lot more if I spent
03:42even longer on it. Obviously, that goes without saying, but just wanted to clarify that it actually
03:46can be and is very lucrative, even more so than I let on. Okay, so the title of this video might
03:51include and why you should too. I haven't decided yet, but I think you should. Now, do you have to go
03:56thrifting and scale it outside of your own personal closet in order to do the side hustle? Absolutely not,
04:01obviously. I did that because one, I just found it really fun, but two, I had a lot of time on my
04:05hands during that time and wanted just to find a good side hustle to do during my year off. And that
04:09would have been limited if I just stuck to clothes out of my own closet that I wanted to sell.
04:13Regardless of how much or how little you want to throw yourself into it, it is something that's
04:17really rewarding, honestly, and just a lot of fun. Let me show you. So, as I mentioned, I am moving to
04:22New York tomorrow and in preparation of the big pack, I kind of sort of cleaned out my closet. I decided
04:28on clothes that I just wanted to donate and clothes that I want to sell if I think they have enough
04:32resale value to be worth the time that it takes to photograph and list them. So, these are clothes
04:37that I'm going to sell. It's hard to tell. There's actually not a ton in here. There's more over there.
04:40But here's a quick rundown on how I'm going to get these sold and how you can do it too.
04:44All right, step one, photograph your item. Good lighting is super important, and if you want to
04:48take it a step further and model the item, I find that it actually sells a lot faster this way. I just
04:53take a handful of photos of me modeling it, plus a few pictures of the item itself,
04:57in any notable details, and pretty much call it a day. Step two, then I go on Poshmark and list the
05:03item for sale. I go over in more detail exactly how to do that in my reselling 101 video, so go check
05:08that out if you want more details. But it only takes a few minutes, and once you get a couple reps in,
05:12it goes a lot faster. And the fun part, obviously, is when it sells, and specifically on Poshmark,
05:17the shipping process is incredibly easy. Every time you sell something out of your own closet that you
05:21don't want anymore, you're making a little money, you're doing something good for the environment
05:24because you're giving that piece of clothing a whole nother life. And three, you're downsizing
05:28your closet or at least making room for something you love and are excited to wear. Also should
05:32mention, and this is going to sound very sponsored, but it's not, if you sign up for Poshmark and plan
05:36on buying anything there, I don't mean out of my closet, but in general, use my code TAKBELL, which is
05:41my closet name, when you sign up and you'll get $10 off your first purchase. So it's a win-win. And even
05:45further, if you want to check out my closet, see what I'm selling, et cetera, et cetera, my closet name
05:50is again, TAKBELL, and you can see everything I'm selling there. And you'll get a personal note from
05:54me. That sounded sponsored, didn't it? Sponsored by Taylor. So I recommend that everyone try to sell
05:59old things in their closet, even if you have zero intention of scaling it into a little business the
06:04way that I did back in the day. And by back in the day, I mean like a year ago, which feels like a long
06:09time. All right, so am I still reselling? I am, yes. However, I no longer go thrifting and buy things for the
06:15specific intention of reselling them. I started my full-time job in consulting, geez, like five
06:21months ago now. It's crazy to me, probably not crazy whatsoever to you, but I simply don't have
06:26time anymore to go and source things to resell the way I used to. But this is the fun part of it. I am
06:31still selling multiple items every single week. And when things are hot, every single day. And that's
06:36all from clothing that I listed over a year ago. Yeah, over a year ago. And that is just sweet,
06:42sweet passive income at this point. When I move to New York tomorrow, again, no, I'm not going to
06:47bring the inventory that is still for sale with me. My mom will be able to ship out any items that
06:51I sell from here on out. I'm going to leave it all here in Los Angeles. Even my dad shipped some
06:55things out for me over FaceTime when my mom and I were in Iceland. And if I remember correctly, I think
06:59he even, you know, just to be extra sure that the thing I sold was what he had in his hands. He did a
07:05little modeling show while I was in Iceland and he was packing it up for me. So if that's any proof that the
07:09shipping process is easy, then I don't know what is. No offense to that. So while I am still selling
07:12things fairly regularly, and I will definitely still list items in my own personal closet for
07:17sale when I feel like I've outgrown them or just don't love them anymore, I am sort of closing this
07:22chapter of my life. That's really strong. But reselling really did define a lot of what I did in
07:28quarantine, a lot of how I stayed productive for a year. Not only that, it taught me, you know,
07:33customer service, the basics of sales, how to know what clothes have resale value. And of course,
07:38if you guys know me, when I was in the thick of it, I had Excel sheets open. I was tracking all
07:42kinds of profit metrics, figuring out what kind of categories sold best, what brands sold best.
07:47I had pivot tables open in Excel when I was doing this hardcore. So it was serious. But perhaps what
07:52I'm most grateful to the side hustle for personally is that it introduced me to YouTube. I don't mean
07:58introduce me like I've been watching YouTube since I was a little kid, but it's why I started YouTube.
08:02If you are a true OG viewer on my channel, you will know that reselling is what my channel was about.
08:07I only made reselling videos when I first started. It felt like the perfect little niche on YouTube
08:12for me to kind of get my foot in the door, for me to feel confident enough to enter the space and
08:16start making videos. And if it weren't for reselling, I don't know if I would have started
08:19YouTube. And it did take me too long to realize that I'm even more passionate about making YouTube
08:23videos than I am slash was about reselling. Not that I have to pick one or the other per se, but now
08:28that I have my full-time job, which takes obviously most of my time, I am kind of closing the book on
08:33this era. And I don't know why this sounds like it's becoming emotional. It's not, but I am so
08:38grateful that you guys, a decent amount of you, like to watch me here on YouTube. I appreciate you
08:42supporting me. So with that, if you don't know, I answer just about every single one of the comments
08:46you guys leave on my videos. So drop one down below. Just say hi. I don't care. I love talking
08:50to you guys. And if you enjoy this at all, don't forget to give it a thumbs up. It helps me a lot.
08:55All right. I'll see you guys soon. Bye. In New York. No, I'll probably do. Wow. I don't know.
09:03We'll see. Bye. That was pretty good. Okay. One take wonder. What if it's really bad? Okay. Do I
09:11sound like 50 years old when I say that? So as, oh, I missed. Is it raining? Gloomy.
09:25Bye.
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